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That's why our critics refer to us as a religion. People motivated by irrational enthusiasm as for a cause, marked by intense devotion to an idea.

Sometimes, we have to step away and look at why we're not winning. Linux makes a good enough mid-level desktop. That's a different subject than the philosophy of free software.

People still talk about stepping outside the box. Many make fun of the term because it's so 90s. They didn't understand what it takes to actually step out of the box or of what the box consists. I consider it a mental framework composed of defense mechanisms and denials.

I also consider that "whoever" wrote the instructions for getting out of the box put them on the outside of the box.

"That's why our critics refer to us as a religion. People motivated by irrational enthusiasm as for a cause, marked by intense devotion to an idea."

I disagree with that for 2 reasons.

1. Most of the critics who refer to us as "zealots" and our enthusiasm as religious do so from either (a) ulterior motives, (b) misunderstanding, i.e., under-informed, or (c) an illogical swipe of a broad brush that should only cover a comparative few.

1.a. It is interesting that Microsoft proponents routinely call free software advocates "zealots". I'm sure you've seen this many times, including both times when it was justified and when it was not. The interesting part, to me, is that the Zealots were a religious group, that is, they shared a common, faith-based belief in an unprovable entity.

Microsoft proponents must accept the software handed down to them from on high based on faith alone. They are precluded by law and the holy EULA from seeing inside the software to verify its inner workings.

Free Software advocates, on the other hand, are not asked to accept the software on faith. They are encouraged to scientifically probe its insides and fix anything they find wrong.

1.b. The needs of many individuals and many businesses can be filled, now, with free software. Most need not give up any functions or features except license fees, the threat of license audits, malware, and some hardware choices. The larger impediment to migration is lack of familiarity. Once a given individual becomes familiar with using free software, they are usually disinclined to give it up.

People like having a software desktop as stable as their hard desktop. They don't like having their computers possessed (either acting as if demon-possessed or in fact controlled by a remote vendor). If you push fairly recently migrated users to sum up why they won't give up their free software, which they were reluctant to even try before, the answer almost always boils down to control. They have repossessed their computer and will not give it back.

1.c. There are lunatics in any group. If most of a group are lunatics, you can properly describe the whole group as a lunatic group. Free software advocates, as a whole, are rationally enthusiastic about the benefits of free software. They are rationally enthusiastic in pointing out the ways secretive software is harmful. The noisy, irrational, lunatics among advocates of any rational idea will always get the most notice. Their existence is not sufficient reason to discard the rational ideas and brand the enthusiasm of the whole group with a label suited only to the noisy, irrational members.

2. The cause for software freedom is far from irrational. Software handles voting, commerce, medical records, entertainment, taxation and collection, cultural archives, and legal documents. Those are extremely important data and too precious to be left to manipulation by secretive black boxes. Beyond the personal interest each of us has in our own software, we have a societal interest in how public data is handled. It is not enough to campaign for the use of public, open storage formats; we need to be able to verify what the software is doing that handles that critical data.

"Sometimes, we have to step away and look at why we're not winning. Linux makes a good enough mid-level desktop. That's a different subject than the philosophy of free software."

I do not disagree with your comparison of features and functions. I disagree with omitting the free software philosophy from the feature list to be compared. This is the single most important feature, in my opinion.

I am willing to give up a great deal of convenience and decoration to gain this one feature. Having this feature ensures that users may attain all of the features they desire, that are possible. Without the feature of free software philosophy, all other features are gained at the whim of the controlling vendor, who may decide that some feature the users desire is counter to the vendor's desire to extract its toll from the users.

Taking the Mac and Microsoft offerings as examples of what users may expect or desire in specific software, in order to assess the current state of comparable free software, is not a bad thing. Disregarding the "free" in free software in order to do that assessment is a bad thing, in my opinion.

Complaining that there is no Photoshop available for GNU/Linux, in my view, is the same as complaining there are no Iron Maidens in the kids' toy room. (No, not the band, the torture device). We have Cinelerra, CinePaint, Gimp, Blender, TuxPaint, etc. (Personally, Photoshop is irritating, bloated, and wastes too much screen realestate promoting itself.)

Comparisons of how or how well free software meets the needs of users with how or how well proprietary software meets the needs of users is helpful. It is not helpful to ignore freedom as a feature. It is not helpful to lament that proprietary software vendors do not offer their wares to be used with free software.

If vendors have something of value to offer which does not require me to give up my freedom, I may be persuaded to pay them money. If they have something of value which does not require me to put full faith and trust in their control of my computer, I may be persuaded to pay them money. I will not rent software, however. There is no justification, IMO, for such artificial scarcity and artificial decay.

But... "free" isn't the main issue. The issue is, "Will this do what I want it to?", and at the moment the answer is, "Not always, not completely, or not without additional frustration that wastes my time." When I go out to eat, 95% of what I want to do can probably be served by a "free" plastic knife too, that doesn't mean the same free knife is adequate for cutting steaks. Frankly, I don't care if you think Photoshop is bloated, it probably is, but I use features like it has in Paintshop Pro all the time and "wish" I had some that its missing, including proper gamma support for PNG files. What I don't like about Photoshop is that its bloody over priced for what is maybe 10% more features than PSP and *way* over priced for the 30% of features is has over Gimp. But, I despise Gimp and all the others you list have all the same problems. If you want to waste time and lose money, you can wiggle around the stuff missing from them, the limitations of how or even "if" they work in some case and pray someone else doesn't steal an account from under you, because "they" are not so short sighted. Not that I have the talent to be worried about that, but I do find myself dealing with cases where what I can and do want to do requires either a) a feature I don't have, or b) 500 times more skill and time than I have to duplicate it the hard way.

I'm with grouch on this. Just omitting Free Software philosophy simply pretty much invalidates the picture as a whole that was painted about GNU/Linux. Without freedom, it may be correct, but with freedom, everything changes.

I don't care about porting proprietary software on GNU/Linux. I don't want it ported because it means people will be loosing their freedoms to it.

And as grouch well pointed out, there is nothing necessarily religious about it. It is guys like Linus Torvalds that like calling us religious zealots and themselves apolitical while constantly going over their own declared apoliticism - but that's how it goes, wrong always defeats itself.

That said, I'm sorry but I find little value in this article. I can see the point, but the point is just not strong enough without the issue of freedom being included in the equasion. If we want to be pragmatic, not only for the short, but also the long term, then the issue of freedom ought not to be omitted. First there was that ideology with the Free Software movement and then, only then people seen that freedom also means better software and went on to focus wrongly on that ("open source") as the key issue.
As soon as you start omitting freedom, you loose the key to what makes Free Software better and the key to what may make it thrive in the future.

With freedom, GNU/Linux as Free Software is not playing on the same level field as Mac OS X and Windows XP. It therefore probably can't even be compared.

"Sometimes, we have to step away and look at why we're not winning. Linux makes a good enough mid-level desktop. That's a different subject than the philosophy of free software."

It is not true that Linux is "Not Winning". I think that linux esktop share is growing at least 15% a year. That would mean that linuc desktop share doubles every four years or so. IT market is now well established, which means that most changes will occur slowly and over a great number of years. Belief that Linux will just overtake Windows one year shows 80's and 90's mentality when desktop PC was still new and great changes would happen almoust over night.

I really wonder how tightly an individual has to hold on to something to make life seem worth while. Human beings don't often distinguish between their mental image pictures and who is actually looking at those pictures. Therein lies a dilemma. That within the symbolic world called our mind lives these ideas, reasons, justifications and pretenses to knowledge. I promise you that within your grasp you will find what will ultimate kill you and separate you from the beauty of living.

So, go right ahead and live this make believe existance where you find yourself so committed to you ideals, that you forget to just live. I'm absolutely certain that someone who cannot step out of the mental prison in which they have constructed the notion of this so called freedom - that someone cannot become an effective advocate. You can not affect an outcome because your world is "you or me" based. Sadly, your credo shouts "I'm OK but you're not OK".

Advocates can create space whereas this tighly woven world of software liberty only creates distance. Without the ability to occupy multiple points of view you create opposition and protestation. No liberty exists in such a mind, in such a concept and certainly not in any world where I would want to live.

The theme of such a life is give me software liberty but don't give me reality or allow me to move the action forward. So, I assert you are stuck. You cannot represent the ideals to which you claim you have a commitment.

To everyone complaining about the omission of the free software philisophy, you're overlooking one critical point: when it comes to the masses buying a retail product, the free software philosophy doesn't matter, compatibility, reliability and install-and-go finish do. Windows XP does that. OS X does that. Linux? Not so much.

It's not about having source code or having free software or being able to verify or modify your programs on a whim. It's about what some guy in a Best Buy is willing to buy and what's within the profit margins at Adobe, Microsoft and Intuit. Right now, that's not Linux.

I have a proprietary, flat-file database program that I have not weaned a local business from yet. It was purchased in 1989, is abandonware, and each month it is used scares me because it has been handling data far beyond what it was intended. It's the last piece of their software puzzle that needs to be made free. As long as it remains indispensable to them, so do I.

This is not good. Their business data should not depend on 1 grouchy old fart, a dbms from the dinosaur age of computing, and the cobbled-up 2492 line bash script I use to translate data from the proprietary dbms to PostgreSQL every quarter.

They tried MS for about a year. I averaged about 3 trips to their office per week, cleaning up messes. The system would not protect itself from their fumbling. GNU/Linux ended that problem. They can't buy a solution without somebody losing a job. It's a razor-edge margin in a highly competitive service market. If not for the quality of free (as in beer) software and my ability to actually adapt the free (as in speech) software to their needs, somebody would lose a job and the service would be taken over by a non-local chain. (If I charged them anything resembling the 'going rate' for what I do, somebody would lose a job).

This is real-world at the fringe: too complex for typical personal checkbook manager software, too small for every billing/accounting 'package' I've found, no margin in the budget for typical service contracts nor full-time IT. The freedom feature has been critical for me to be able to pull that business out of a void that exists in computer software offerings. I hope now you can see one of the reasons I consider it so important.

I am glad you could apply your background, experience and ability to make cold comparisons of systems as you did in the article. That is needed. If you sift through the junk at slashdot and digg, there is some significant discussion to be found. Even if there was nothing in the article itself worthwhile (the opposite is true, IMO), the discussions it sparked are of considerable value. People are dissecting the systems in public forums. Awareness was raised. Some myths were debunked. Perhaps if you had emphasized freedom, many of the people involved in those discussions would have dismissed the whole thing and missed the opportunity to either see or participate in all that information being swapped.

Quoting:Perhaps if you had emphasized freedom, many of the people involved in those discussions would have dismissed the whole thing and missed the opportunity to either see or participate in all that information being swapped.

I think you understand the subtext of the article completely. We haven't tabulated all of the hits but on March 20, 2006 over 100,000 people engaged in life. Some philosophers say that life is a conversation. I know that humans enact their symbolic world and a connection exists cybernetically between beliefs and actions.

In the midst of all that the silent observer inside us all watches and learns. In quantum physics the practitioners refer to the being as the ghost in the machine. If one muddles through life with nothing but their unchallenged beliefs, we can't make progress.

So, if those 100,000 people got only a slight glimpse of the action, then they should have understood the requirements and specifications required to move to the next level. For Linux the next level has to do with what others want. So, we talk about a service model. Well service means providing value and value means something is useful and usefulness means serving the purpose of another.

Frankly, the free software community seems so proud of their cause that they forgot the mission. I consider myself an advocate of free software and today, I hope we focused the attention of many communities on what's wanted and needed.

Quoting:The theme of such a life is give me software liberty but don't give me reality or allow me to move the action forward. So, I assert you are stuck. You cannot represent the ideals to which you claim you have a commitment.

What a nice way to twist an argument. So I am stuck and unable to represent my ideals because I stand firmly by them instead of wavering from them on the next wind of so called "reality"?

Haven't you noticed that I have talked about this "reality" in my post? I said the following:

Quoting:As soon as you start omitting freedom, you loose the key to what makes Free Software better and the key to what may make it thrive in the future.

So I asserted that it is exactly freedom which brought GNU/Linux to a point where it can even be compared with a giants OS like Windows XP. It is freedom that made it matter even when it was technically worse than proprietary software and it is freedom that in the end made it better than many proprietary software. What do you think would have happenened if Linus didn't put linux under GPL or even if GNU was started for any other reason except freedom? I imagine GNU/Linux as we know it today wouldn't even exist or would simply not matter at all.

It is exactly this philosophy, this ideology for which you accuse me of being stuck to that made this reality today possible, and you tell me I am loosing touch with reality!?

Quoting:So, go right ahead and live this make believe existance where you find yourself so committed to you ideals, that you forget to just live.

So I should have a special day by day schedule for when I am going to be a Free Software advocate commited to my philosophy and when I am gonna be off of that just living a life?

If you are commited to something then you are commited to it at all times. That becomes an integral part of your life. If it doesn't then you're nothing but a pretender, thinking that you believe in something, but wavering from it the next chance in life you get to justify your wavering.

As I said, I got the point of your article. The FOSS community certainly has alot of work to do to make GNU/Linux the best technical choice for everyone including people that don't yet give a damn about philosophy, but I don't agree with your approach. I don't agree porting proprietary software is even part of the solution because, apparently unlike you, the reason I want as much as people to use GNU/Linux and Free Software is because I want them to be free, thus making a world a better place to live. Porting proprietary software to Free Software doesn't bring much freedom to anyone.
Instead, we should focus on fostering the development of Free Software alternatives.

Quoting:What a nice way to twist an argument. So I am stuck and unable to represent my ideals because I stand firmly by them instead of wavering from them on the next wind of so called "reality"?

You haven't got a clue about what I said. I'm absolutely sure you know how to present your ideas. You also know how to deal with content but you could master the art of context.

Until you do, don't go around with the arrogance that you represent me or any other person who believes in furthering the cause of software freedom unless you have their permission. You don't have my permission.

Right now, you're a self-appointment emissary.

I'll try to reach you another way. I'll define the difference between an enlightened person and a jerk.

A jerk doesn't know his ass from a hole in the ground.

An enlighten person doesn't know his ass from a hole in the ground and knows it.

I reread the discussion and my posts and I can see my tone was a bit arrogant. I apologize for that. Your post stroke a chord at me it shouldn't have, and I sure could have presented my response in a nicer way.

They should use free software if, and only if, it meets their needs better than proprietary software. For people who value freedom over convenience, this will be true most of the time. Most people don't value freedom over convenience, so for them, free software often doesn't meet their needs. That's what Tom is pointing out.

In order to solve a problem, you usually have to realize you have a problem which needs to be solved. I suspect that Tom, by pointing out the problem, is hoping to jumpstart the process of solving it.

Quoting:Most people don't value freedom over convenience, so for them, free software often doesn't meet their needs. That's what Tom is pointing out.

Yes. I see that, but then I think we shouldn't be helping them to continue to not value their freedom by offering them ways to switch to GNU/Linux because of proprietary software ported to it.

I think that the cause IS (or at least should be) our mission. I don't see much of a point for Free Software anywhere else, but in the Free Software philosophy and the value of freedom. As soon as we omit that in any context thinking that in that context it somehow doesn't matter, I think we're actually going against our mission.

To clarify myself, I am not here to tell Tom what and how to write. I'm here to express my opinion and make suggestions, as a reader and a Free Software advocate. My suggestion isn't even that the article should *emphasize* freedom. No, it is not an article about Free Software philosophy. However, it should at least include it in the "feature list" as grouch put it. At least say that one of the biggest advantages of GNU/Linux over Windows XP and Mac OS X is that it gives you more freedom and control over your computer, just as the "feature" worth considering.

I also wouldn't suggest proprietary ports as solutions, though I agree with acknowledging that people miss this or that proprietary tool on GNU/Linux. I just think that in light of what our real mission should be, the way one is to respond to this acknowledgment is by encouraging the community to develop or perfect alternatives so that we can one day say to people: "here is this program, it is not (insert wanted proprietary program), but it is just as good if not better and with a familiar interface and best of all you're in control, because it's Free Software".

Help them become free, even if they yet don't value being free, because that is the whole point of Free Software from the beginning, to give people freedom, to put them in control.

Here is my view being both a developer of 16 years and a computer user of longer. As a developer, Linux has a lot going for it, with exceptions. Since, I'm a visual person, when it comes to debugging, I'm 1000 times more productive with a dang good debugging IDE, then with anything else. Linux open source debuggers are still years behind MS, Intel, etc. in what I like and am very good at using.

As a user, and hoping to reflect most (above 95% of computer users), I don't give a crap about the freedom to fix, manipulate, or contribute to open software. My time is limited and I am not going to waste it on software that does not immediately meet my needs. If I were to tally open software applications vs. proprietary applications in meeting my needs, it would be the latter. Why? because their business depends on it. Whose neck is on the line for any of the open software? Does your food come from supporing it? No. Hence, it will never be as good at meeting my needs as proprietary software. Economics drives the business and commercial world, not free software. Ideals are nice and should be adhered to, but some issues just don't matter.

By the way, how is it that free and freedom seem to be in the same paragraphs from FSF/OSF advocates? The two are not equivalent and have little to do with each other.

Many commercial libraries also sell their code. But, I bet FSF advocates still decry it as not having freedom.

Why is free software so much better than free food? Which is really more important? This is what really confuses me about FSF/OSF advocates. I don't advocate either should always be free. The best working economic model is free enterprise; which means the exchange of goods. Communism and socialism (and all other 'isms) have proven out to not work in the long run. FSF is communism in the software industry.

Now that I've stated an extreme opinion. I actually like a lot about open software. What I don't like about it is FSF's extreme attitudes. Btw, they do not represent freedom any more than Red China does. Many knock the EULA's of commercial software; well have a look at all the licenses and restrictions from FSF/OSF. Exactly why are they any better? And so many....

For those who decry freedom in software: distribute your code without restrictions (yes, that means I may use it for commercial gain) and I'll believe in your cause. I'll even make sure proper credit is due. I do know there are some free software licenses that allow such; but, FSF doesn't even support those licenses. I think that for every commercial license being requested to be dropped, so should every FSF/OSF license be dropped. Otherwise, FSF advocates are no different than commercial advocates, just different goals.

It looks like he got a lot of people in several online discussions to point out what the free software philosophy is and why it should not be left out of any comparison. I don't think the article was written as flame-bait; it doesn't contain the necessary buzz-words for pushing buttons. It does appear to have been very effective in enlisting the audience in educating itself.

I noted one person on Slashdot had never heard of Ubuntu. He/she sure has, now. ;)

davidwt: I hope you don't mind me saying, but I think you're severely misinformed about FSF and Free Software because they are not against "commercial" nor are they against free enterprise and free market. There is nothing communist about it either. In fact, Free Software (and by that I mean software with which you have freedom to run, copy, modify and share) is what makes true free market in the software field possible. Look at what proprietary software does to the "free market"; monopolies and increasing loss of user control. And when user is not in control, then what happens to the "customer is always right" principle?

I sometimes even say that Free Software allows for capitalism in a software field the way it was truly meant to work.

I know that as soon one starts shouting words like "freedom" and talk of ideology people who mostly care about business above all else tend to cover their ears or even dismiss the talk as extremist, but what about the fact that this freedom means better business, freer market, lower entrance barrier and thus ultimately a more rapid growth of the software industry and innovation?

> Does your food come from supporing it? No. Hence, it will never be as good at meeting my needs as proprietary software.

No proprietary software provider earns anything from supporting code they've already sold. Support is a cost, not a revenue source. Now, if you want to sign up for a $$$ 24x7 support contract, that's another matter. Those same support contracts are available for many free software programs, of course, but you want to ignore that minor detail, don't you?

> Economics drives the business and commercial world, not free software. Ideals are nice and should be adhered to, but some issues just don't matter.

"Man does not live by bread alone." Some things matter whether "the business and commericial world" thinks they do or not.

> Why is free software so much better than free food?

Food is a physical item, a given quantity of which can only be consumed by one person. Software is not. Any number of people can use a software package without denying other the use of the same package. This is either deliberate misrepresentation or willful ignorance.

> The best working economic model is free enterprise; which means the exchange of goods.

The FREE exchange of goods. I.E., at terms agreed to by both parties. If some of those parties have different priorities than you, and therefore choose differently, that's none of your concern.

> What I don't like about it is FSF's extreme attitudes.

Fine, no one said you had to. No one here is even trying to force you to use their code.

> Many knock the EULA's of commercial software; well have a look at all the licenses and restrictions from FSF/OSF.

The restrictions in the code from the FSF (i.e., GPL'ed or LGPL'ed code) are on the developer, not the user. The restrictions in most EULA's are far more restrictive, and are on both. Again, either deliberate misrepresentation or willful ignorance.

> For those who decry freedom in software: distribute your code without restrictions (yes, that means I may use it for commercial gain) and I'll believe in your cause.

I'm sure you would. Sorry, no deal. I'm not a programmer, but if I was any code I chose to write would be under the GPL. You don't like that, tough, you don't have to use what I write. I don't care if you believe in my cause or not. I do.

> I do know there are some free software licenses that allow such; but, FSF doesn't even support those licenses.

As noted before in an earlier discussion, the FSF recognizes the BSD license as being free software. They think the GPL is better, so that's what they use. You can use whatever you want.

> I think that for every commercial license being requested to be dropped, so should every FSF/OSF license be dropped.

The BSD license, which does exactly what you claim you want, is a recognized OSF license. Now, tell me again exactly what it is you want.

> Otherwise, FSF advocates are no different than commercial advocates, just different goals.

Of course they're no different except for the goals. That's like saying there was no difference between Roosevelt and Stalin except for their goals. The goals are what define a person or organization. This one definitely qualifies as a deliberate misrepresentation.

> but then I think we shouldn't be helping them to continue to not value their freedom by offering them ways to switch to GNU/Linux because of proprietary software ported to it.

Well, except for one minor detail, I agree with you. Hoever, it's possible that some niche software cannot be reasonably developed under a free license, and will have to be developed as proprietary software. Note that I'm not saying this is certain, merely that it's possibly the case.

> I think that the cause IS (or at least should be) our mission.

I agree, but I think the evidence is solid that most people simply don't care, and trying to convince them on that basis is useless. If that's the case, should we try to convince them using other (from their perspective, equally valid) arguments, or do we abandon them to the proprietary vendors.

If we want to convince them anyway, we'll have to overcome what they view as obstacles in their path. I think Tom was trying to list some of those obstacles. The best means of doing this is a matter for discussion. I personally perfer to use free software wherever possible, but not everyone agrees. I think I know your position on the matter. :)

davidwt:
You sure have picked up and latched onto a lot of misconceptions!

>"Linux open source debuggers are still years behind MS, Intel, etc. in what I like and am very good at using."

Looks like the key phrase there is what follows "etc.". You want the software you're familiar with and nothing else will ever do. By your defined yardstick, there is no hope for anything, at any price, to dare challenge what you like.

Your whole 2nd paragraph is silly on the face of it. You provide no evidence of being elected to speak for "above 95% of computer users", nor do you provide any surveys or studies to indicate that group's thoughts, yet that doesn't stop you from proclaiming, as self-appointed representative of that group, "I don't give a crap about the freedom to fix, manipulate, or contribute to open software."

Apparently there are a great many people who care about that freedom. Otherwise, how is it that software that has $0 price tag is the focus of so much business news and so much discussion among individual computer users? Why is the world's biggest software company spending so much time, effort and ink in disparaging free software? (See the very recent article telling about Microsoft spending $500,000,000 on advertising to counter talk about open source). I suggest your vehement dismissal is misplaced.

>"Does your food come from supporing it? No. Hence, it will never be as good at meeting my needs as proprietary software. "

And your needs, as a self-proclaimed developer who absolutely refuses to have anything to do with free software, would those needs be to charge license fees for your proprietary software creations? What about your customers' needs? Are those to be considered if and only if they do not interfere with your desire to rent your software?

Free software is definitely a threat to such a business model. It has a tendency to commoditize most software at a price of $0, while adapting to suit the customer, not the vendor. Free software tends to evolve to meet users needs, not the "needs" of software landlords.

The business part comes from the fact that skilled developers, unlike software, are a limited resource. Once software is created, copying and distributing it is essentially a zero-cost operation. The things that are not zero-cost are determining the customer's needs, creating a solution, and maintaining that solution as conditions change.

Free software allows people to create and maintain their own solutions. It does not prevent businesses from springing up to do those things for other people who do not want to create and maintain software, or who cannot.

I'm willing to pay for a certain software solution, but I'm not willing to rent it in perpetuity, nor am I willing to purchase a closed, secretive 'black box' which may lose its magic at any moment. Developers need to grasp the GPL ahead of their customers, to be prepared as more potential customers learn how the GPL works for them.

>"Why is free software so much better than free food?"

Answers:

0. If "free" is defined according to the GNU philosophy, that is, it regards freedom instead of price, then "free food" is a nonsense phrase. If "free" is defined as a price of 0, then "free software" may be a good aspect, because it is a gift, or it may have a bad aspect, if the given software does not allow the recipient to use it in helpful ways.

1. Food, unlike non-free software, may be studied by the consumers of food to try to grow better food. Non-free software does not allow users to study it to understand how it works. Software which is non-free attempts to halt advancement as if we were back in the dark ages and knowledge is the sole province of a privileged few.

3. Food, unlike software, is not something you reuse over and over to manipulate other things that you own. Once you eat the food, you do not eat it again, nor can anyone else. You cannot eat the free apple, then improve that apple and let your friends eat the improvements. If you use software, it does not get consumed. It is available to be used again and again unless it is deliberately designed to prevent reuse.

If I make a gift of an apple to you, I cannot control your other property with that apple. If I make a gift of non-free software to you, I may be able to use its secret operations to do harm to your computer or your data. Spyware, spamware, viruses, trojans and worms are examples of such software gifts.

If I make a gift of free software to you, you may make use of the freedom to use it and the freedom to study it to make improvements to it and then use the freedom to distribute it to share those improvements with everyone else.

>"For those who decry freedom in software: distribute your code without restrictions (yes, that means I may use it for commercial gain) and I'll believe in your cause."

You are free to use free software for commercial gain. See Red Hat, IBM, Sun, etc. What seems to be your real complaint is that GPL software does not allow you to hide it from your potential victims and remove freedoms from them that the software grants to you. You don't seem to be a very nice person, to me. I will stick to doing business with those whose business does not depend on harming me.

Quoting:Hoever, it's possible that some niche software cannot be reasonably developed under a free license, and will have to be developed as proprietary software. Note that I'm not saying this is certain, merely that it's possibly the case.

I don't think there is an intrinsic need for a proprietary development model in any field.
If there is a niche software field that is hardly going to be filled by a developers community alone due to lack of their interest, there is a possibility of recognizing the need of the users in that field as an opportunity and building a business around it to motivate and sustain the development. It can operate on a service model, but it could initially even sell copies of software to cover initial development costs.
So even in these harder software fields it doesn't have to be proprietary. It can just be more commercial then usual in order to better motivate the development, but still stay Free Software (as in freedom).

Quoting:I agree, but I think the evidence is solid that most people simply don't care, and trying to convince them on that basis is useless. If that's the case, should we try to convince them using other (from their perspective, equally valid) arguments, or do we abandon them to the proprietary vendors.

Yes, we should try to argue on their own grounds. However, arguing on their own grounds doesn't necessarily have to exclude the point of software freedom. I think it is well possible to present the point of freedom on their own terms, in a way which they will hear it as something they wanted to hear, something desirable for them.

That is what I mean when I say that the point of freedom should at least be put on the "feature list". You don't necessarily need to argue ideologically. Just draw them the benefits. Eventually, you'll be able to get them to listen to the deeper arguments on part of the whole freedom philosophy.

However, if we just drop the philosophy trying to somehow argue without it included anywhere in the argument presented in any way, we are putting ourselves at risk of sacrificing too much to win them over.

What do I mean by "too much"? Well, if the cause is our mission and we sacrifice the cause to win them over, then we have essentially sacrificed the mission. What are we winning them over to then?

Quoting:If we want to convince them anyway, we'll have to overcome what they view as obstacles in their path. I think Tom was trying to list some of those obstacles.

Indeed, the proprietary software they're missing on GNU/Linux. Should we have it ported or not? I say no, as long as it is proprietary software, for the reason I outlined above. But there are still options; either encourage development of free alternatives or convince the developer of those wanted programs to free the code.

Quoting:The best means of doing this is a matter for discussion. I personally perfer to use free software wherever possible, but not everyone agrees. I think I know your position on the matter. :)

Daniel, write articles for LXer instead of putting them in the comments section. I don't think comments should run this long. You're obviously eloquent and prolific. Help Lxer become a stronger advocate. Our comments don't get picked up by the major syndicators but our articles do.

Um... no. This is actually a protected right. Just because you can't read a disassembly doesn't take it away. If you want to run with the big dogs, you have to go potty in the tall grass.

If learning assembly takes too much time for you, think about what it's like for a non-developer to learn C++. That disassembly is every bit as good for you as the C++ source is to the average computer user. That's how much real people want and need the source code: even if they have it, it's worthless to them, so they don't CARE.

> Most need not give up any functions or features except...

Accountability. Any jackass can start an open source project, but it takes a certain level of professional ability to put a shrink-wrapped box on a store shelf. Once you put that box on the shelf, all kinds of federal laws suddenly apply to you, and I'm guaranteed certain rights and recourses. I like that, and I place a certain value on that.

> Free software advocates, as a whole, are rationally enthusiastic...

...about things I don't need.

I manage major software projects. I do not normally have enough time to do things as well as I would like. I do not normally have enough budget to hire all the people I need to do things "properly". So when some random guy proposes that I use software my own people can maintain and support, I tend to look at him like he's just sprouted an extra leg from his forehead.

I want someone else to be in charge of my software, because I simply don't have the time or the manpower. If it breaks, I don't want to reorganise my project priorities so we have time to fix it, I want to make a phone call and drop it in someone else's lap. I have enough problems, so anything I can make into someone else's problem is good.

And as a developer myself, I always resent being told that I have to stop working on an interesting problem to figure out why one of our TOOLS broke. Tools are boring. They should be left to the kind of people who are excited by them, like developers who work for a company where their project *is* the tool in question.

This is very much where most businesses are. Good developers are expensive. A team of competent developers might produce a $300,000 profit by building commercially exploitable projects, or they might just suck up $200,000 in overhead while they support your toolset. Personally, I'm not in a position to piss away a half million dollars annually for an ideal, and I don't know many people who are.

>> They are precluded by law [...] from seeing inside the software
>
>Um... no. This is actually a protected right.

A right that is protected by law, copyright and possibly patent law.

> Accountability. Any jackass can start an open source project, but it takes a certain
> level of professional ability to put a shrink-wrapped box on a store shelf. Once you
> put that box on the shelf, all kinds of federal laws suddenly apply to you, and I'm
> guaranteed certain rights and recourses. I like that, and I place a certain value on that.

You have never actually read a EULA that is included with shrink wrapped software. Along with all of the restrictions on reverse engineering and modifying are a host of disclaimers that say essentially “we do not warrant that the program will do anything useful, and are not responsible if anything bad should happen.” Likely the only thing that you would get back is what you actually paid for the software, but no damages. This is how things are in the US. In other countries your rights may be different.

Of course, these EULA provisions have not actually been tested in a US court that I am aware of (I am not a lawyer) but attempts to make computer hardware companies and Microsoft actually honor the refund offer for an unused and unwanted pre-bundled operating system in the Windows EULA have not been successful.

> I want someone else to be in charge of my software, ...
If someone else is in charge of your software, then they are in charge of your computer, not you. If they decide that you are cheating on the EULA, there is nothing to stop them from shutting your computers down until you pay up. And you have no recourse because you agreed to these “self help” conditions in the EULA by installing and using the software.

> I want to make a phone call and drop it in someone else's lap.
What do yo do if, after 6 hours on hold (at least it was an 800 number), and another two days exchanging crash dumps via e-mail, you are told that “Yes, this is a bug in our product, but the product is being phased out and you have a exotic, one of a kind configuration, so we are not going to fix it.”? Sue the vendor? Rip out their products? What do you do if the vendor has gone out of business? (This was in the currently shipping OS version at the time.)

I got that reaction from a closed source PC UNIX vendor and we replaced their systems with new Windows NT boxes, replacing both the hardware and software as the old systems could not handle NT. This was an expensive upgrade. The new systems still had to be rebooted every day due to a WAN card driver issue, which was also not fixed by either software or hardware vendor and, thanks to the EULAs, there was no recourse except to not buy from these vendors in the future.

On another project, I choose to use an open source web application server. This tool was at the heart of the application that we were developing. The developer announced that he was taking the web site down for a couple of days when he moved, but that it would be up again by the end of the week. Four months later, my supervisor learned that the vendors site was still down and I got to illustrate the one of the real advantages of open source software. Since I had the complete source code, it did not matter that the vendor had vanished off of the face of the Earth. I could fix any problems and add any needed new features myself.

When using closed source, binary only software you are at the mercy of the vendor's whims. The open source tools at least give the ability to support one self if the vendor dies, graduates and has no time, or simply loses interest.

The main difference between open source and closed source software is one of rights. With open source/free software the computer user is in control while with closed source software the control lies with the software vendor.

The key difference I've found in my dabbling in ubuntu is that it seems so difficult to get the basic operation-system stuff working. Specifically connecting to the internet on a USB modem (which, let's face it, is how most home users connect) and getting access to my non-linux hard drive. I haven't yet quite given up, but I'm close to it. I suspect there's a hidden mass of people who try it for a week and then give up for ever (or at least until the "click-to-connect" icon is working in some later release).

This "where's the beef" thread explores brilliantly the issue of the linux community's tendency to be a little defensive about any feedback that comes it's way. The "why don't you ask for a refund?" response seems to come just a little too quickly on many of the forums I've visited.

Why am I putting these two [unconnected] thoughts into a single post? Because I suspect that getting USB modem connections for the masses in linux isn't a priority simply because we have linux for its own sake, because it's beautiful like Esperanto and it's free and that's great, written by and for people with easy access to university LANs and a perverse love of the command line. It could alternatively be a dangerous culture gap: USB ADSL is not widespread in the US, but it's the way most people connect from home in Europe. Either way, if we really want to promote linux as a widely-used alternative to windows, then it's time exactly for the sort of objective comparison provided by tadelste, and for the linux world to start asking for and listening to feedback from the ordinary user, who just wants stuff to work.

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